Winners, losers from the Rudy Gobert trade to the Timberwolves

This blockbuster trade does not fit neatly into the “winners and losers” paradigm we use to measure trades on this site.

It is possible for the Timberwolves to have gotten better by landing three-time Defensive Player of the Year Rudy Gobert and still to have overpaid for his services. It’s also fair to question how this roster plays out in the regular season vs. the playoffs.

And while the Jazz bring home a treasure chest of draft picks, this is just the first move in Utah — they say they are going to rebuild on the fly around Donovan Mitchell, but plenty of people around the league think Mitchell could be on the move and a full rebuild is coming. How we ultimately view this trade will depend on the moves that follow.

That said, let’s try to break down this trade, which looks like this:

Timberwolves recieve: Rudy Gobert.

Jazz recieve: Malik Beasley, Patrick Beverley, Walker Kessler, Jarred Vanderbilt, Leandro Bolmaro, four first-round picks (unprotected first-round picks in 2023, 2025, 2027, and a top-five protected first round pick in 2029).

This new setting will better show off what a defensive game-changer he is. There had become a complacency about how he anchored a team of primarily poor perimeter defenders in Utah — even Anthony Edwards got in on the act, saying he feared Kristaps Porzingis more as a defender than Gobert.

This new setting — and covering up Edward’s youthful defensive errors — will better show off what a force Gobert is as a rim protector and defensive quarterback in the paint. Karl-Anthony Towns is not a great defender and now will have to guard more on the perimeter, where he will be a turnstile. D'Angelo Russell is not a good defender. Gobert will clean a lot of that up — he landed on a team